He’s Got The Beat

David Northrup wants aspiring musicians to follow their drumming dreams

Chittenango-bred drummer David Northrup compares making it as a professional musician to winning the lottery. But Northrup didn’t just win the lottery: He hit the Mega Millions jackpot when he was asked to help finish a record started by his musical idol, the late Toto percussionist Jeff Porcaro. 

It’s just the crowning touch on a long list of accomplishments for the session musician, who now resides in Nashville. Northrup is home this week, however, to headline two drum clinics and offer several private lessons during his stay. 

Northrup, 43, began playing music and singing in choir in fifth grade, then performed in jazz and concert bands at Chittenango High School (he’s a 1987 graduate), as well as extracurricular rock groups. It wasn’t until after a year of college at SUNY Cortland that Northrup felt the pull toward a professional career in music. 

“I figured out that {college} wasn’t for me, so I came home—I think in 1989—and had some pretty interesting jobs for a guy without a college education,” Northrup says in a phone interview from Nashville. “It seemed like everything pointed to music, so I just thought, ‘I gotta stop fighting this.’ I think this is what God put me here to do. This obvious thing.”

So Northrup buckled down with private drum lessons, although he was increasingly restless with the local music scene. He made the move in 1990 to central Florida, an area he had heard was ripe for aspiring musicmakers; indeed, within six months he was able to support himself as a musician.

Meanwhile, Porcaro passed away in 1992 at age 38. He left behind an incomplete album, Deeper Shades of Blues (E Flat Productions), in the hands of Les Dudek, a guitarist who has jammed with the Allman Brothers, Boz Scaggs, Steve Miller and others. Northrup was playing a Sunshine State club in 1993 when Dudek stopped in to admire the young skin-hitter’s style. 

“He said that he had this album he hadn’t finished up and he wanted to stay in the same vein of the drummer who started the project,” Northrup recalls. “He asked me to finish it, and my very first national recording credit was on an album with my drum hero who had passed away.”

In Florida, Northrup hooked up with a Top 40 cover band that took him on the road full time, a gig that generated enough cash to pay the bills (most of the time). However, when he made the move to Nashville it proved a challenge for his chops. “The bar up here {in Nashville}, as far as level of musicianship, is pretty incredible, so I was humbled, to say the least,” he says. “I got my butt kicked quite a few times in musical situations, doing some sessions and stuff, and I really had to work on some things that I’d neglected.”

How to read music was on that list of neglected lessons. Northrup wanted to become more than a drummer: He wanted to become a musician. “Unfortunately, a lot of drummers don’t get that,” he says. “They play drums, but they don’t play music on the drums.”

Northrup honed his skills for five years, playing with various bands and as a session drummer, but decided to find a full-time road gig in 2000. He missed out on positions that were given to other talents, such as Elton John’s former drummer, Charlie Morgan, who landed a job with Tricia Yearwood. But Northrup did win the shot at drumming for country singer Travis Tritt, a nine-year gig that led to much touring in the states and Canada, as well as TV appearances on awards broadcasts and late-night gabfests with Leno and Kimmel. 

In 2005 he and Tritt played at Times Square venue B.B. Kings on the same night as the Jammy Awards, the jam band world’s answer to the Grammys. Electronica jam act, The Disco Biscuits, were playing the awards show and invited Tritt’s group to join the jam at Madison Square Garden. John Mayer, Bruce Hornsby, Questlove and others also played that night, but the Biscuits were in need of a drummer—and Northrup was their man. 

“Oh my God,” Northrup reminisces, “that was really an incredible privilege. It flew by so fast and the music is so hypnotic. One of the really crazy highlights of that night was being backstage with Huey Lewis and having him be all over me, like, ‘Dude! You were amazing!’ He asked me for my {business} card, and luckily my drum tech at the time was standing next to me, because I was like, ‘OK, You heard that, right? Because if I tell anybody, they’re not gonna believe me that he asked for my business card.’” 

Northrup is currently working on a solo record and regularly holds clinics around the country, something that began while he was touring, whenever the band wound up with extra time. He was recognized as “Country Drummer of the Year” and the No. 2 “Clinician of the Year” in a Modern Drummer readers’ poll in 2008 and 2009, and was also featured in the June 2008 issue. 

During his local stay, Northrup will give free clinics at Christian Brothers Academy, 6245 Randall Road, on Wednesday, Feb. 8, 3 p.m. (call 446-5960 for details) and at New Hartford’s Big Apple Music, 8441 Seneca Turnpike, on Sunday, Feb. 12, 2 p.m. (732-3502). He will also teach private lessons at SubCat Music Studios, 219 S. West St., on Friday, Feb. 10, by appointment only (478-0684). 

Northrup hopes that his clinics hit home with aspiring musicians who have the need to succeed, just as he did. “I’m continuing to do this to inspire young people to follow their dreams,” he affirms. “I’m not really overly special, but I was able to step out of the Central New York area and follow my vision that I think God had for me in my life, and I’ve been fortunate to have success. If I have an opportunity to inspire another potential musician, then that’s time well-spent.”     

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